Fili looked around, as if trying to get out of the situation he had just put himself in. Moving from foot to foot and glancing at the ground before fixing his gaze on me, I could tell he was nervous to tell me what he wanted to say, but didn't know how to say it. Fili also looked scared which was an expression I was not used to seeing on my big brother's face.

"Kili, listen. I can't go into a lot of detail right now, but Uncle Thorin has been hearing about rumors of an attack for a while."

"What kind of rumors? Who's attacking us?" I asked, focusing on my brother, hoping I might get some answers to his and Uncle's behavior.

There was a roar of screams coming from our left near the entrance to the village. Dwarves started running in our direction towards the fortification of the mines.

"Everybody, RUN!" I heard Thorin shout from somewhere in front of us.

Fili immediately went to grab my hand and started running towards our Uncle and Dwalin. There seemed to be a panic dash as everyone ran, screamed, and tried to hold onto their loved ones. In the hectic mass, Fili lost his grip on me and I could no longer keep up with him in the crowd and eventually I lost sight of him.

Before I could even think about calling my brother's name a dwarf woman from the village grabbed my arm shouting, "Please, please help me. I can't find my daughter. My little daughter, please, help!"

I didn't know what to do. People usually ran to Thorin and Fili for help, and now I had no idea where they were. Looking at the woman, however, I did feel the urge to help her.

"What's wrong?" I asked, gently grasping her arm in support.

"My daughter is still in the town, I couldn't get to her," she said crying.

Call in recklessness, or the confidence of youth, but despite everyone else running out of town, I started to run right into the thick of something I never wanted to be a part of.

Meanwhile…

Fili kept running, after Thorin told everyone to run, there was no way he was going to disobey that order. It wasn't until he had almost reached the mines that he noticed his brother was no longer behind him.

"KILI!"

Receiving no response, Fili started going against the current of dwarves heading to safety. He had only made it a few feet before someone grabbed his arm.

"Fili, what do you think you're doing?!" panted his Uncle Thorin.

"Uncle! I can't find Kili! He could still be in town." He panicked as all of the ideas of what could happen to Kili raced through his head. "I've got to find him, there's no telling what they would do to him."

Thorin looked both saddened and sickened on seeing and hearing Kili wasn't with his brother.

After a long sigh he said, "Fili, we can't go back. The town has been destroyed, I doubt they would have left anyone alive."